


the city sings them back to you

by brandywine421



Series: we might be hollow, but we're brave [2]
Category: The Defenders (Marvel TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-24
Updated: 2017-08-27
Packaged: 2018-12-19 06:00:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,136
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11891517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brandywine421/pseuds/brandywine421
Summary: He heard her coming long before her feet stomped into the elevator and was adjusted to the thick smell of the liquor, two cubes of ice under 4 ounces and a splash, by the time she reached his apartment."Still trying to make me look like a respectable alcoholic?" Jessica asked, taking the glass with a grunt of thanks and two smooth swallows. A tinkle of ice and then two crunches before her tongue darted out to lick her lips.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> IDEK.

  
He heard her coming long before her feet stomped into the elevator and was adjusted to the thick smell of the liquor, two cubes of ice under 4 ounces and a splash, by the time she reached his apartment.

"Still trying to make me look like a respectable alcoholic?" Jessica asked, taking the glass with a grunt of thanks and two smooth swallows. A tinkle of ice and then two crunches before her tongue darted out to lick her lips.

He took that as a 'thanks', too. He didn't ask if she was okay or if she needed to talk. He had an idea of what she needed.

"Come on, let me feel you up," Matt said, smiling when she huffed out an actual laugh. He took the bottle before she could drain it without sharing. A pillow hit the floor beside the couch and she settled in place, leaning back against his knees.

She held something over her shoulder and he realized it was a well-worn brush. "I don't want to use your ex's leftover hair supplies anymore. Trish did a whole interview on that shit."

He missed that episode. He also missed why she would care who his 'hair supplies' belonged to when they weren't dating.

He put the brush aside and strummed his fingers through her hair, massaging her scalp with careful fingers so her heartbeat didn't sputter or flinch. "Since I usually send you into the bathroom for the brush, it's not like I'm choosing it every time."

"No, you need to get rid of it - all of it. If you're really over your exes then you shouldn't keep their shit around," Jessica snapped but he could feel the tension bubbling out as he started to brush and detangle her hair in preparation for braiding.

"There's no nostalgia in hairbrushes for me, Jess. I never brushed any of my exes' hair, let alone braid," Matt snorted.

"Then who taught you?"

"Nuns and sorority girls."

She froze and he focused on sorting her silky hair into manageable parts. "I'm insulted or flattered, I'm just not sure which way to go with it."

"Braiding your hair is not foreplay," Matt said. "And I'm pretty sure a couple of those brushes are Foggy's."

"It's foreplay for the massage; but that's not the point I was trying to make before you distracted me with sex talk," Jessica said, tilting her head forward as he twisted and weaved her hair to clear the way to her neck.

"You brought it up," he reminded her.

"Trish brought it up," Jessica muttered. "Braiding hair as foreplay, fuck is that?"

"No idea. I like loose hair, it's very sensual when it brushes across my skin."

"Oh," she replied with a skip of breath. "Right."

He thought a massage would relax Jessica and they'd done it a few times - the banter and unspoken touch therapy was a mutual indulgence. But her pulse was sharper than a few moments before so something had changed.

"Sorry, I said something wrong," he said before he read the wrong signals. She was a good friend, one he intended on keeping around.

"No, I just forget about your super-weird touch thing sometimes. So if hair-braiding's not your play, what about massage?"

"How did we get from hairbrushes to foreplay again? Because I'm going to need to know before I touch you again." He's usually much better at this - whatever this is - he should be better at it.

"Forget it, I'm being weird."

"It happens. But for the record, you'd know if I was giving you 'that' kind of massage because I'd have you undressed and tasted first," he said.

"Well, you already know what I taste like, you bought the whiskey."


	2. Chapter 2

 

He didn't laugh and he didn't put his blessed hands on her stiff neck. She'd gone too far. She was so bad at flirting.

"I only have one-night-stands with people I don't intend on seeing again," he said, that deep growl of the devil slipping through.

Why did he have to break that voice out, as if she wasn't already doubting all her life choices today.

"That explains the braiding. Nuns or sorority girls. So either you don't fuck me at all or you fuck me once and never call me again," Jessica considered out loud.

"I need a drink." She passed him the whiskey and snorted when he drank straight from the bottle. She watched the way his throat rippled and wondered what his neck tasted like undeneath the scruff. "Stop trying to be cute and talk to me."

She had never in her life 'tried to be cute'. Jessica Jones was not cute material.

"We're friends, Jess, and I honestly haven't sensed any clues from you that you were interested in me for more," Matt said. He reached out and took her hand, curling her fingers around the neck of the bottle in slow motion, or just more delicacy than she was used to.

"You never brush up against me just to make contact," he continued, trailing his fingertips to the knot on her wrist and up to her sleeved elbow before squeezing gently. "You don't wear heavy perfume or laugh at my jokes to make me notice you. You don't flirt with me."

"You just don't know what flirting looks like," Jessica muttered, taking a swig of whiskey without dislodging his hand on her arm.

"Maybe you just don't know how to flirt with a blind man," he countered.

"You give me massages and I let you braid my hair," Jessica blurted out. "That's a lot of trust from me."

"I know and that's why I would never want to misinterpret that." He paused and squeezed her elbow again. "You trust me?"

She huffed, she wasn't going to say it again.

He tugged gently and she shifted her position to face him as he slid into a haphazard lotus position on the floor with her. "I always take your elbow when we're in public because I love that you don't flinch. I like how you smell without flashy chemicals, just clean and sharp like wine. I like that you don't think I'm funny so I have to always try to impress you," he said, taking both her hands and inhaling deeply.

"Now who's trying to be cute," she whispered but didn't pull away. She was drawn to him, wasn't that what started this whole mess?

"I don't want a one-night-stand and I'm a terrible boyfriend," Matt said, leaning in close and raising his hand, close enough for her to feel the heat of his skin but not quite touching.

"So what, you want to date or something?" She wasn't sure she was 'date-ready'.

"I want to kiss you."


	3. Chapter 3

 

 

  
She didn't think this would be considered kissing, or else she'd been doing it wrong her whole life. Or maybe everyone else had been doing it wrong.

He cupped her cheek and tilted her face just enough to connect their mouths - lips together and his tongue slipping inside - he kept saying he wanted to taste but this was devour - his thumb stroking her chin before he pulled back and she surfaced for breath.

"Jess."

"Asshole," she replied, touching her lips, still damp from his. She wasn't drunk enough for this. "Today was a good day. I paid my bills, even made enough to throw a paycheck at Malcolm and I - god, it pisses me off that I have to spell out 'friends with benefits' for you. I wanted to hang out with a friend and get laid but since Trish was busy tonight and we haven't banged since our twenties - I came here."

"Okay, I get it," he smiled, huffing out a laugh. "No strings and you won't get weird and stop coming by?"

"God, we're both adults. Consenting ones and everything."

"Which is why we needed to have this talk. Also why this talk is now over."

She narrowed her eyes at him. "So you're cool with casual sex? Then what was with the kissing first stuff?"

He kissed her, taking her breath again as he guided her off the floor and to her feet. "Needed to see if you were serious and can't do that with my eyes."

"You're not half as smooth as you think you are," she said.

"Yet here I am, thoroughly seduced."

* * *

She was noisier than he'd expected, in all the best ways - soft moans around his tongue, huffs into his neck, grunts into his pillow - and more responsive than he could have dreamed. She was as desperate for touch and he was desperate to feel - kissing the spots that made her shiver and focusing his full attention on making her hiss curses at him when he got it right.

"Why haven't we been doing this all the time?" she panted when their bodies finally admitted defeat and the air was thick with sweat and sex.

He chuckled despite himself. She was so full of shit.

She draped her arm across his chest, tracing her fingers over a long, old scar. "None of those sorority girls got to see you all scarred to hell."

"Yeah, I didn't take my shirt off a lot. That one's old. Stick's training style left a lot of marks." He didn't say that Elektra had the same scar in the same place from a different time.

"Ouch, sorry I mentioned it."

"Not like it matters. You know my story, I'm not ashamed. They're just reminders of lessons I've failed," he shrugged. It was useless finding a dry spot in the ruined bed.

"Not so much since you lived through it."

"Sometimes," he hummed. Her stomach rumbled, audible without his enhanced hearing. "Did I give you an appetite?"

"Asshole."

 


	4. Chapter 4

 

 

  
It should be weird. Matt Murdock was a bucket of issues and she probably painted a target on her own back if any of his homicidal exes turned up - guy like him surely had more than one psycho in his past.

Hell, the danger factor was part of his swagger and she'd fallen right into the trap.

It should have been weird. He was a bad boy - and an altar boy - and it shouldn't make any fucking sense.

It didn't make any damned sense. But it wasn't weird.

She didn't bother pretending to sleep with his built-in lie detector and settled in to watch him wash up through the open bathroom door. She was relaxed enough to nap but enjoyed the view as he retrieved his phone.

"Dinner?"

"If you're buying," she replied.

"I had a feeling you'd say that," he laughed and went to his dresser and chose a pair of loose sweatpants, running his fingers over the fabric before making his decision. "Mexican okay?"

She nodded and it took a moment for her to remember he was blind. "I nodded."

He tilted his head toward the window. "You might want to get dressed, I hear Danny coming."

"Seriously? But I was having such a good day," she groaned.

"We can make him pay for dinner," Matt said after a beat.

"And drinks," Jessica said. "We both have total sex hair."

Matt snorted and told his swanky phone to call Danny with his task and tossed her a brush - her brush - before padding out of the room.

It wasn't weird, and that probably should worry her.

* * *

"Her friends hate me," Danny repeated mournfully, poking at his taco with chopsticks from the sound of it. Matt was too relaxed to feel that bad for the kid. He was a kid and Colleen adored him.

"Duh, you're the boyfriend, her friends are required by girl law to hate you," Jessica said, warm against him on the couch. "I hate all the guys Trish dates, she has the worst taste."

"Colleen's friends aren't dating you," Matt added.

Danny sighed. "I don't know why I'm talking to you guys about relationship advice."

"Because Luke didn't answer when you called?" Matt answered. Something hurtled toward him but Jessica snatched it out of the air. The crunch that followed indicated it was a nacho projectile.

"You're probably trying so hard to impress them that you're just embarrassing you and her. Believe it or not, you're not that awful to be around when you aren't acting like brat," Jessica said.

Danny choked on his beer. "Jess, that's the nicest thing you've ever said to me. Do you feel okay?"

"I take it back - I'm calling Colleen and advising her to ditch you immediately," she replied dryly.

Colleen and Danny were both so terrifyingly young and deep down, he really wanted them to make it work.

He'd never admit it, though. He wan't going to be the one to jinx it.

He hoped he hadn't jinxed his friendship with Jessica because he could definitely get used to afternoons like this, minus Danny.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An exercise in trying to write a little bit every day. It used to be easier than this. Thanks for hanging in and indulging my muse!


End file.
